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Mind power
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The human brain is so powerful that its therapeutic effects and ability to manage pain cannot be undermined
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If you think something is going to hurt a lot, it just might. But you may be partly to blame.
Researchers have found that people who are falsely told they are about to get a heat stimulus that is more painful than the one they actually receive later, describe it as having been more painful than it was. Their brains also react as if the pain level were greater.
The researchers, writing in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, also found that if volunteers were given more heat than they had been led to expect, they experienced it as less intense.
The reduction in pain, the study said, "rivals the effects of a clearly analgesic dose of morphine."
For the study, led by Dr. Tetsuo Koyama of the Wake Forest Baptist University Medical Center in Winston-Salem, N.C., the researchers asked 10 subjects to agree to be given 30-second doses of heat at three temperatures, none producing burns.
Each time, a tone signalled that the heat was about to begin. The length of time between the tone and the heat was tied to the intensity of the stimulus. (The stronger it was, the longer the wait.)
The results, the researchers said, demonstrate the power of experience to affect how the brain responds to pain. The study also suggests the value of developing therapeutic techniques that teach people better ways to manage pain.
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